Southern-born rocker Tom Petty, of lead singing Heartbreakers' fame, said he's sorry he once used the Confederate flag as part of his musical image – he was "stupid" and didn't know the historical controversies surrounding it.
Petty used the flag on stage during a tour 30 years ago, the Times of Israel reported. But given the swirl of bad press the banner's seen in recent weeks, as well as its removal from the South Carolina Capitol, he said he wishes he never used it.
He told Rolling Stone the rebel banner was "the wallpaper of the South when I was a kid growing up in Gainesville, Florida," but that he was "pretty ignorant of what it actually meant."
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Petty's 1985 Southern Accents album included the Confederate flag as part of the marketing for the tour, mostly because of a song on it called "Rebels."
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He said, of the story behind the song: "It's spoken from the point of view of the character, who talks about the traditions that have been handed down from family to family for so long that he almost feels guilty about the war. He still blames the North for the discomfort of his life, so my thought was the best way to illustrate this character was to use the Confederate flag."
But he regrets using the banner.
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"People just need to think about how it looks to a black person. It’s just awful. It’s like how a swastika looks to a Jewish person. It just shouldn’t be on flagpoles."
